Posted by AzBlueMeanie:
The U.S. Supreme Court has saved its most controversial cases for the last week of the 2012 term. Monday is orders and opinions day, and an additional opinions (and possibly orders) day is likely to be announced on Monday. The Court has eleven merit decisions to announce this week — it is unlikely that all eleven will be announced on Monday.
Kedar Bhatia at SCOTUSblog.com has a summary of the eleven merit decisions of the 2012 term to be announced this week. Merits cases remaining for October Term 2012. Here are the cases to watch:
Fisher v. University of Texas at Austin 11-345 – Affirmative Action in college admissions.
Vance v. Ball State University 11-556 – Supervisor liability under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
Koontz v. St. Johns River Water Management District 11-1447 – Land use takings claim.
Shelby County v. Holder 12-96 – Voting Rights Act Section 5 preclearance constitutional challenge.
Mutual Pharmaceutical Co. v. Bartlett 12-142 – Whether federal law preempts state law design-defect claims targeting generic pharmaceutical products.
Hollingsworth v. Perry 12-144 – (California's Prop. 8) Whether the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment prohibits the State of California from defining marriage as the union of a man and a woman.
United States v. Windsor 12-307 – Whether Section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) violates the Fifth Amendment's guarantee of equal protection of the laws as applied
to persons of the same sex who are legally married under the laws of their State.
Adoptive Couple v. Baby Girl 12-399 – Whether a non-custodial parent can invoke the Indian Child Welfare Act of 1978 (ICWA), 25 U.S.C. §§ 1901-63, to block an adoption voluntarily and lawfully initiated by a non-Indian parent under state law.
United States v. Kebodeaux 12-418 – Claim regarding the application of the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act (SORNA).
Sekhar v. United States 12-357 – Whether the "recommendation" of an attorney is intangible property that can be the subject of an extortion attempt under 18 U.S.C. § 1951 (a)(the Hobbs Act) and 18 U.S.C. § 875(d).
University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center v. Nassar 12-484 – Whether the retaliation provision of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 requires a plaintiff to prove
but-for causation, or instead requires only proof that the employer had a mixed motive.